Mr. Cuomo prods the Legislature

From today’s editorials: Kudos to the governor for staying focused on his budget goals, but we expect more from the Legislature than a rubber stamp.

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There’s Governor Cuomo on camera, sticking to his guns on delivering a budget that closes a $10 billion gap and doesn’t raise taxes. There he is, railing about special interests and lobbyists. There he is, all but daring the Legislature to shut down government.

What you think of the governor’s use of the bully video as a budget negotiating tactic depends, of course, on whether you agree with him or not. Our review is mixed.

We’re pleased to see a governor who doesn’t cave and stays focused on his core principles in the face of all the complexities of crafting a state budget. We’re glad to see him light a fire under a Legislature that tends to see deadlines as annoyances created for the very purpose of being ignored.

The open question, though, is whether Mr. Cuomo appreciates deliberation as much as deadlines.

What the governor had to say on the video was largely not surprising. He has been consistent in at least stating his goal of having a balanced budget that forces the state to reduce waste and inefficiency and not raise new taxes. Revealing that special interests are working hard to get more spending into the budget is like saying it snows in Albany in winter.

Where the governor surprises, though, is in raising the specter of the first state government shutdown in New York that anyone can remember, either because the budget isn’t on time, the Legislature doesn’t see things his way, or both.

We’ll assume Mr. Cuomo accepts that the Legislature isn’t his rubber stamp, and that he’s a little more flexible than his script writers let on. We also note that he’s already broken his no new taxes pledge, by proposing, in the name of Medicaid reform, new charges on doctors and hospitals that will surely be passed on to patients and anyone with health insurance.

No one craves new taxes. But we’re willing to hear the case for them, and Mr. Cuomo should be, too. That’s the deliberative process, governor.

As for a shutdown, with a week to go before the April 1 start of a new fiscal year, and no sign of any major discord among state leaders, such drama seems a bit premature. So we’ll assume Mr. Cuomo was looking to prod the Legislature to get a budget done on time, so it can get cracking on all the other big things left on the agenda — contract negotiations, a property tax cap, ethics reform and rent control, to name a few.

On time, though, means more than just having the budget done by April 1. It means giving lawmakers and the public time to review it before a vote. A good budget, after all, is more important than an on-time one, though it shouldn’t become an excuse for failure to act.

We would be pleasantly surprised to get both. If a little bluster accomplishes that, then bully for you, Mr. Cuomo.